Frequently Asked Questions About Time Travel - TV Review

'yes, that is Anna Faris in that picture and no, we have no idea what she's doing in this film either'

First things first: yes, that is Anna Faris in that picture and no, we have no idea what she's doing in this film either. Whether sucked in via some bizarre time warp or billed here as a supporting act for some other similarly inane reason, Faris does indeed complete the cast of Frequently Asked Questions About Time Travel opposite a trio of British actors who seem to run the gamut of actorial evolution, from almost entirely unknown (Marc Wootton) to rising comedy star (Chris O'Dowd) and everything in between (Dean Lennox Kelly).

With the actors split pleasingly into three, the film can also be divided along similar lines with an initial third that works well, if predictably, a middle third which fails on many levels and a final one that leaves a sort of 'ho-hum, is that it?' feeling. The script by Jamie Mathieson keeps things moving between each segment quickly and fairly humorously but its own weaknesses are reflected in the film's overall body; an over-willingness to indulge in the theory behind time travel and a miss-guided foray into horror being chief amongst them.

The horror element, whose introduction signals the start of the middle third, is most obviously inspired by Shaun Of The Dead's British genre-crossing (a fact attested to by one of the film's posters), but where that film had horror as its core, FAQ tries to bolt it on as a side element and therefore wastes a lot of time creating tension and threat that aren't really core to anything that's been happening in the rest of the plot.

What is happening in the rest of the plot is mainly explained to us by Miss Exposition herself Faris, who shows up like a movable MacGuffin to give our plucky heroes some new crucial bit of information. Despite this lowly character status, Faris is actually the most interesting thing here, an accolade earned through the complete lack of chemistry between the three 'best friend' leads. This coupled with a general feeling that we're watching a feature-length pilot for Mathieson's new series, is sadly a fact which condemns FAQ to the bargain bin of British humour rather than to the Simon Pegg shelf which it obviously aspired for.